Future Shock
by Panther Nesmith
Summary: It's back! Future lives of several of our favorite mutants! Romy
1. Chapter One

Hey All!  
  
Here it is! Fixed up and ready to go! Woot!  
  
Disclaimer  
  
I own nothing on a stick. Do not use this without my permission.  
  
***  
  
Rogue watched the man across from her very carefully. He was the man she'd been hunting for a while now. It was amazing that he wold try something so arrogant and stupid. It really, actually, shocked her. That anyone who obviously knew she was hunting them would voluntarily break into her business. He had to know it was her he'd run into back in Barbedos.   
  
It wasn't like she tried very hard to keep her identity a secret while she was hunting. She had a reputation for being very open with her prey. This one had even been a commision. That was unusual as well. This whole thing felt weird to her. She wasn't a big fan of weird.  
  
Beside that, the man had seemed familiar to her from day one. She had to barely glance at his picture to memorize what he looked like. It was a little disturbing. It was also making her a little uneasy. Things didn't happen like this.  
  
She let her mind stray back to her usual (but not first (if you'll pardon the pun)) profession. He was a very fine example of a man. Tall, good hair color and length, nice build, obviously deft with his hands, and the eyes were a very desirable characteristic.   
  
Red and black was very rare. Red had taken grey's place as the most unusual, but not impossible, eye color. People whose eyes were entirely a non-tradititonal color were especially good for her line of work. He might replace John, whose eyes were light blue, surrounded by bright yellow, like the fire he was obsessed with, as her most unusual man.   
  
Not to mention the way her captive spoke; his voice, facial expressions, and there was just something about him that was undenyably sexy. Not that any of this affected her judgment in the least. Really. He was just another man to her, below her boys, because he was someone else's problem. He would be worth a little less dead, or missing his fingers. However, he would be worth getting new fingers for. For business reasons of course. And if she chose to train him, well, that was her business. She was well known for turning a profit from situations, and men, like this. Even if he would be without his fingers.  
  
That was Raven's intention. But, Raven had said that as long as she had the man's fingers, The rest of the body was Rogue's, if she wanted it. New fingers would be easy to find, and Rogue could get rid of one of the mainly useless boys she'd aquired. The thought made her a little more at ease with er current situation.  
  
---  
  
Gambit was mentally kicking his own ass. He'd know going in that while what he was doing was the only thing to do, it was stupid at best, fatal at worst. The plan had been simple. Sneak in, steal anything not nailed down, then frame someone else. Generally people get distracted from someone else's commission when they've been robbed blind. It was basic psychology, and his uncle had made sure he knew psychology very well.  
  
Gambit had underestimated his opponent, and that was dangerous. The woman had caught him in her safe, and without a word pulled two guns seemingly from thin air, and warned the shadows that if they moved, they would be shot.   
  
Gambit was glad he'd decided to do this alone. After the safe, which had a trap on the inside, the dogs, and the people everywhere, coming in, going out, laughing, drinking, kissing, and such, he had never expected to be caught by the woman he'd been trying to rip off.   
  
A partner would have been put in here with him, and the rest of the thieves were like his family. Not that he didn't have enough family on his own. HE wasn't sure he could live with he guilt of having them die too, if he managed to live after being given to however had set teh price on his head.  
  
He looked at the woman holding the control to his bonds. She had beautiful green eyes, and hair that was mainly light brown, but with a few stripes of black running through it, like tiger stripes; back when they were still alive. She was watching him with an intensity and attention that even the best security camrea couldn't hope to imitate.   
  
Gambit wished desperatly that the woman after him had been anything but a madame. Getting her guard down and sleeping with her, then leaving as soon as she was asleep would have been the best way to end his night. But, he already knew that was out the window.   
  
The man decided it couldn't hurt to try. What could this woman do that was worse than losing his fingers? He tugged on the bonds on his hands, trying, once again, to distract her attention so he could sneak a little bit of charm in.  
  
"Ah hope you don't plan on figitin' much more. Ah've got a good old fashioned whip in the closet ovah there, an' Ah know how ta use it. The comission said dead o' alive. Ah wouldn't even loose sleep ovah killin' you." [Not that Ah had so much sleep ta begin with.]  
  
Gambit gave her a smile that sent all but members of the oldest profession's managment teams into a girly swoon. Rogue gave him a look that spoke of her resistance to his charm, and how little se really thought of him as a man.  
  
"Soun's kinky." Rogue smiled sadistically, and Gambit felt his smile start to fade. He wasn't sure that what he'd said had been the best move.  
  
"Ah only have ta given Raven yo' fingers, and proof that they belong to you. The rest is mine to do with what Ah will, if Ah'd like. An' trust me, death is bettah, even a slow death from blood loss." The sadistic look was still in place. Rogue was tired of his trying to escape, even if he hadn't done anything drastic. Honestly, Rogue couldn't wait until the whole thing was over. A sentiment she shared with Gambit.  
  
The whole thing was giving Gambit a bit of deja vu. Not that he'd ever been captured, obviously, but something about it all seemed like it had been done, or something like it had been done, or maybe it was just the woman in charge. He knew everything about her, the feeling he was having had been pretty strong when he was studying up on the pertinent information. Now it was back. Had to be her, as much as the idea worried him. She was strong. She'd caught him herself. Knowing a woman like that was only an advantage if you knew her as a friend.  
  
---  
  
Gambit's mind flashed back to the study. Everything had been going well enough. He'd gotten into the safe, and except for a small needle prick, he was unharmed. Then the hairs on the back of his neck pricked up, and he turned around just in time to see Rogue walk into the room. She had a gun drawn, and Gambit watched another one follow it at almost lightning speed. She had kept one pointed at him, and casually told the shadows that if they moved they would be shot. He had to respect the woman. She had balls, figurativley speaking.  
  
Rogue watched him, trying to look merciless, when she wasn't sure that was the case. The bare room seemed to close in around her and the man, like a cloak, or a straight jacket, while the table stretched immpossibly long, separating the two of them by so much it was unbelieveable. It was probably the man's paranoia changing the psionic controls to the room, which had made it look like an interrogating room in those cheasy last century police shows in the beginning. If her psycology didn't fail her, he was feeling uncomfortable about being closed in, and isolated from everyone, including her. It seemed familiar somehow, but she couldn't put a label on it. But part of ehr was taking great satisfaction in the fact.  
  
Gambit was desperate for a way out. The room felt like it was closing in, like a coffin, a cocoon, a premature burial. Under any other circumstance, he would have been alright in this room. But something about being trapped makes everyone feel claustrophobic. At least that was his view on the situation.   
  
The table was pushing him against the walls. It was going to suffocate him, and the woman would watch him with those eyes the color of new life, and watch him die slowly, and probably never care that the room had killed him.   
  
He felt like screaming, just to get her to blink. His mind flashing with the ways he'd screwed up, how he should have covered his tracks, it was chaos inside while cold reality was easy enough. The woman was killing him with his own mind. He would die or go insane. Then the room widened, and the table went away. Gambit forced his body to stop panicing.  
  
Rogue had the controls to the room in her hand. She sighed as the room went back to the way it usually was. Gambit's chair went from wood to metal, and hers did the same. The table went away, but the intercom that had been sitting on it hovered next to her. The room turned a grey tone, like metal that didn't shine. Rogue's eyes stayed on Gambit, but she noted the door, which was now much heavier looking, and had twice as many locks as Gambit had imagined. This made her smile a little bit.  
  
Gambit looked around him. He'd heard about these kind of rooms, but they were illegal in most counties. Then again, so was prostitution, and Rogue didn't seem to have too much of a problem with that.  
  
***  
  
So, whacha think?  
  
REVIEW!  
  
Peace and Love,  
  
Panther Nesmith 


	2. Chapter Two

Hey All!  
  
Disclaimer  
  
Isn't putting the word 'disclaimer' there enough of one. It states in itself that I own nada.  
  
***  
  
"Do ya like that little trick? Usin' ya own paranoia against ya. SLick, ain't it?" Rogue said proudly, while Gambit tried to stop his heart from beating a hole in his chest.  
  
"It's. . .somet'in', chere." He managed to say. Rogue ignoed the way her heart fluttered when he called her 'chere'. It was just the effect of the language on her. But she couldn't help but think of him the way a normal woman would. Something about him got under her armour, and rubbed almost painfully against her soul. The lack of control on him and her reaction to him supremely annoyed her.  
  
She was about to say something aimed to break him, when an intercom next to her squacked. A male voice, as clear as if he were in the room announced somehting that made Gambit's heart seem to expand to sink and choke him at once.  
  
"Raven's on her way up, ma'am." Rogue sighed with relief. Then chided herself for it. Another part of her mind demanded to know why that part had sighed. The part taht had sighed simply shrugged. Rogue frowned. Usually she had better control over the others in her head than this.  
  
"Send 'er up, Dominic. Ah think mah guest is dyin' ta see her." Rogue drawled, feigning non-challance like a pro. She was used to putting up acoolf ront under pressure.  
  
There was a chuckle from the other end that made Gambit cringe. "I'll bet he'd give his right hand to have this over with, huh?" The man on teh other end of the intercom said, his voice merry withmore than at winge of satisfaction to it.  
  
Rogue rolled her eyes. There were two things that were constant in her life. Death and Dominic's bad puns. She played with a black pendant, decorated with a sickle moon and two stars, absent-mindedly. Gambit recognized it the second she pulled it out of the body of her dress.   
  
The government paid a lot of money to keep certain unscrupulous activities under their control. If you were really talented at anything, the government put you into one of their guilds. The moon and stars belonged to members of the first profession. He knew that all government call girls wore them. And Madames didn't, usually. He frowned, wondering what that could mean. It beat the hell out of imagining what having your fingers cut off feels like.  
  
Rogue snapped her fingers, puling Gambit out of his daydream. He jumped, and Rogue laughed a little. "Penny fo' ya thoughts. Ah love ta hear about mah victim's feelings." Rogue leaned forward, as if she expected him to answer, adn wanted to amke sure she heard.  
  
Gambit watched the fabric of her shirt shift down her chest, and saw the other mark he had expected to find. A snake coiled around a rose. One of the few government terrorists. He was so engrossed in it, he didn't even notice someone else was in the room until a searing pain split the back of his head in half.  
  
Rogue laughed a little, a nervous, flighty sound. She had been looking over Remy, since he had been distracted by her cleavage. And lots of bells were ringing in her head, mostly ones that triggered lust and other related emotions. To Rogue, all things evetually came back to lust.  
  
"Really, you should keep the prisioners under better control." An authoratixe female voice slightly behind the person who had hit Remy. He supposed the man on the intercom had hit him, and now Raven was coming to collect what she thought he owed her. His suspicions were confired whent eh voice that had chcukled so coldly at Gambit's fate intoned the worst wrds he had ever heard.  
  
"Raven's here to collect the man's fingrs."   
  
***  
  
Oooh. Suspense. Bet you can't wait to find out what happens.  
  
You may be a lover but you ain't no REVIEW!  
  
Peace and Love,  
  
Panther Nesmith 


	3. Chapter Three

Hey all!  
  
Sorry I skipped the reviews last time. I was in a hurry to update. I shall do them this time, but at the end of the chapter, so they'll not be in the way.  
  
Gambit turned in his seat. The woman in the door was an imposing figure, her skin so white it was almost translucent. It resembled scales more than human skin, and Gambit knew that they were better armor than most weapons manufacturers could make.  
  
Next to her was her son, who went by the codename Nightcrawler. He was tall and lanky, not as deathly pale as his mother. In fact, he was most definitly light blue. You could also see the stubble of full body fur growing in. His completely white eyes showed no emotion, a stark contrast from his mother's which were yellow and gleaming maliciously, as if she held the world's most horrific weapon in her hands, and she knew she'd survive if it was used.  
  
What she actually held in her heands was an incredibly cruel looking knife, with dried blood on the handle, making it even more horrible. Gambit was entranced with it, like a bird staring into a snake's eyes.  
  
Rogue stood up to greet her guild leader. Raven's necklace, a biohazard symbol embossed on a circle colored like a bar code, shone int he harsh lights. Nightcrawler's necklace was of similar make, but much smaller. Rogue dug in the top of her unifrom, pulling out a necklace with two emblems on it. One the moon and stars of her most profitable profession, and a biohazard symbol almost completely identical to Nightcrawler's.  
  
"Ah tolja Ah'd get 'im." Rogue said smuggly, as another man walked into the room. He was wearing nothing but a pair of loose satin pajama pants that went pst his ankles. He had a set of magnetic shackles in his hands. The man looked grungy, like he'd been put through a wringer and thrown on the ground.  
  
"Avalance, Ah, wancha ta make sho' he can't move his arms even a tiny bit." ROgue ordered, having seen the look on her guild leader's face. Raven couldn't comand Rogue's men, but she could make Rogue do it for her.  
  
"Of course, mistress." Avalanche answered, sounding only slightly sarcastic, much to Rogue's surprise. She sighed and was very glad Dominic had decided to keep a civil tongue in his head. It looked so impressive when her men did what she wanted without being asked mulitple times, or excesive smart assed comments.  
  
"Rogue, I must admitt, this is better work than expected." Raven said, turning the blade of the knife in her hands. Gambit only broke eye contact with the knife when Avalanche grabbed his hands and shoved them into the shackles. He was turned with his back facing his captor and her employers. Gambit silently prayed to Lady Luck, when a pair of cool hands were placed on either side of his face.  
  
"Shhhhhh." A low and soft voice hissed in his ear, as Raven stepped in front of him, malice shining in her eyes. Gambit felt parts of his brain leakig away. The last thing he saw was the knife heading for his fingers before passing out and floating on a soft cloud of sleep.  
  
REVIEWS!  
  
D. Puppy- Glad to see you're so passionatee about it. grin hope this sates your need for more.  
  
Star-of-Chaos- A very bad one indeed, which is the point.  
  
Chaos- Glad to hear I've caught your eye.  
  
A fan- I tried to update sooner, but I don't think I did. Ah well.  
  
ish- No fingers would suck. Johnny Depp has no fingers in Once upon a time in MExico? Damn, I wish I'd seen it now. Just to see how he does with no fingers. ah, different body part. Okay. And I think I'm closer to a bear on beer than anything else, but at elast I update eventually. Thanks for the review!  
  
Want to see your name here next time? Well, then I've got one word for you. REVIEW!  
  
Peace and Love,  
  
Panther NEsmith 


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